Discovering the truth
By : Justyna Wrobel
Jedwabne, a town about 180 kilometers northeast of Warsaw, has been on the lips of many for the past few months. Sixty years ago the city's residents exterminated its Jewish population a gruesome event that still shames Jedwabians today.
It was not until last year, however, that the issue was thrust into the international spotlight when New York University Professor Jan Tomasz Gross, a Polish Jew who emigrated in 1968, published the book "Sasiedzi" (Neighbors), which is based on a story by a Jew who had survived the massacre in Jedwabne.
In his book, Gross described the events of the July 10, 1941 pogrom of 1,600 Jews, the majority of the town's population. According to him, the town's Jews were rounded up and led to a barn, which was was later set on fire. Afterward, townspeople mutilated the corpses. Gross accuses the Poles of genocide, claiming no Nazi involvement a bitter point of contention among historians.
When "Sasiedzi" hit the bookstores, residents of Jedwabne were at first shocked, but then quickly grew tired of the daily visits by strangers looking to establish facts and discover the truth about the events of two generations past.
"What a bunch of rubbish this book is," said Edward, a Jedwabne resident who was seven years old in 1941. "It's beyond comprehension how he can write that Nazis weren't here that day (to provoke or order the crime)," he said. "He even wrote that murderers were cutting off the heads of their Jewish victims and playing football with them. What rubbish." Edward recalls being in a Sunday-school class that day. "I remember that the priest wouldn't allow us to leave the rectory, but after that tragedy we could all smell the stench."
He added that he doesn't believe that 1,600 Jews were killed. "(The barn in which they were burned) was only eight by 12 meters, so how was it possible to lock that many people inside it?" Edward said that only some of the city's residents were involved in the crime, and that the murderers wanted to exact revenge for Jews' (unfriendly behavior toward Poles) once they became members of the NKWD secret police (later the KGB) after the Soviet invasion of Poland in September 1939.
According to Edward, Jedwabne is deeply offended that the world perceives them as being responsible for a crime committed by their ancestors 60 years ago. "All these people should apologize to us for what is happening now."
In fact, Jedwabians are hoping for someone to come along and eliminate the reason for their shame.
"Some scientists came here last Saturday to examine the place where the bodies are buried," said Edward's neighbor. "Finally the truth will come out. And it's already surfaced that the number of victims wasn't as large (as 1,600)."
"People hear what they want to hear," countered Andrzej Przewoznik, the general secretary of the Council to Protect the Memory of Battles and Martyrdom (ROPWiM), which has been charged, along with the National Memory Institute (IPN), with the difficult task of discovering more details about the massacre.
"We've conducted geophysical and archeological research to clarify where the remains lie," Przewoznik said, adding that details about the research would be released this week. "Now, knowing the dimensions of the grave we will be able to estimate the number of victims."
Related website which may be of interest include:
Yedwabne: History and Memorial Book
Rzeczpospolita has a web page in Polish devoted to the subject of Jedwabne.
